Sergeant Salvatore "Sal" Pernelli was a character who appeared in three episodes of the CBS-TV series M*A*S*H, Season 9's "'Twas the Day After Christmas" and "The Life You Save" and Season 10's "A Holy Mess" . The part of Pernelli was played by veteran character actor Val Bisoglio.
Note that Bisoglio also provided the uncredited voice of the M*A*S*H P.A. Announcer in numerous episodes. As Pernelli is established as a long-serving member of the 4077th, it is possible that Pernelli (alongside Private Danny Baker) is one of the two otherwise unknown announcers we regularly hear over the P.A.
About Pernelli[]
For most of the series, it was unknown whether or not the 4077th even had a mess cook, despite the constant complaints from the soldiers about the food. Most of the complaints were directed at Private Igor Straminsky as he was serving the food, but Igor was never revealed as the actual cook, and in one episode, Igor explicitly stated that he didn't cook the food, he just served it. In Season 1 "Cowboy", Mike Robelo had a billing as cook but his name was not given. With Pernelli's appearance, the question as to who was responsible for the lousy food was finally answered.
Sergeant Pernelli is portrayed as a jaded and indifferent NCO, who neither knows nor cares about actual culinary arts, and in any case receives nothing but WW2 surplus ingredients, forcing him to prepare all of his recipes from the Army manual with whatever is at hand. He also seems to have few helpers except Igor, causing him to take shortcuts and work long hours just to keep up with the 3 daily meals. He has no apparent emotional reaction to his job of feeding the camp but has enough pride to feel quiet scorn when outsiders try to voice opinions on his job performance.
In "Twas the Day After Christmas", Pernelli had the pleasure of having Major Winchester working under him in the 4077th's Christmas Day observance of a British Army tradition called "Boxing Day", where officers trade places with enlisted personnel for a day. Winchester prepared an ambitious menu, but Pernell was not interested in complicated meals that required esoteric ingredients. He conveyed to Winchester, in no uncertain terms, the urgency of getting the food cooked fast - with the hoards of people that come into the Mess Tent, they don't have time for fancy meals! Pernelli also reveled in assigning the snobbish Winchester to wash and scrub all the dishes, pots, and pans between meals.
In The Life You Save, Hawkeye was assigned peripheral duty as mess officer and tried to convince Pernelli to serve French Toast, giving him detailed step-by-step instructions on how to make it. Pernelli then halfheartedly applied Hawkeye's instructions by mixing a huge vat of powdered eggs and dumping numerous slices of bread in the vat, to "absorb the froth".
In A Holy Mess, a grateful Korean farmer awarded the 4077th fresh eggs after a US Army infantry unit helped to liberate his chicken farm near the camp. Pernelli was enlisted to prepare the eggs at a special brunch, but bristled as everybody wanted their individual eggs prepared to order. Pernelli unilaterally decided to scramble them all. When the eggs were ready to serve, the Mess Tent was unavailable due to Father Mulcahy holding supposed sanctuary for AWOL Private Nick Gillis. When Hawkeye and BJ came up with the idea of relocating the brunch outside, Pernelli refused to serve.